Home > Consumer Reviews > Panasonic DECT 6.0-Series Dual-Handset Cordless Phone System with Answering System (KX-TG1032S)

Many years ago--over a decade ago in fact--I purchased a Sony SPP-AQ25 cordless phone & answering system. This was before the 900 MHz phones, and it has a big long antenna sticking out the top of it. It broadcasts and receives at 44 / 48 MHz and the sound quality is virtually indistinguishable from a corded phone. I'm not exaggerating. And the range is incredible. 100 feet or more, although out that far the sound quality deteriorates. The answer system uses a tape for recording messages but has a digitally recorded greeting. I paid $120 for it back then in 1998 or so. The handset is large and easy to hold, but light, and the buttons are very large and easy to activate, and the action and accompanying sound when depressed is also excellent.

Why do I mention this? Well, for a long time now I have been worrying: what will I do when my Sony SPP-AQ25 dies? What could possibly replace it? I've purchased two or three cordless phones for my parents and in-laws over the last five or so years, and have never been happy with the phones. They all fell far, far short of my own. They had poor sound quality, poor range, were small and difficult to use, and were just plain cheap.

Well, a year or so ago, I looked into the issue more thoroughly, hoping to find a replacement before it was needed, and to my relief I discovered the Panasonic DECT 6.0 phones. I liked the KX-TG8232 best of the Panasonic line, but when I tried out the handsets in person at Target, I wasn't entirely pleased with how they felt, with their ergonomics. I also thought the color LCD was maybe unnecessary. So, I kept on using my decade old Sony, although I kept the 8232 in mind.

Then, a month or so ago the answering machine part of my Sony phone died. The motor (or belt) that drove the tape would no longer actually drive it, and so no message would get recorded. I proceeded directly to Amazon to order the 8232, but found that it was only available via a market place seller. This gave me pause and made me wonder what newer Panasonic model had replaced it, which led me to this very phone system here: the KX-TG1032S. So, hoping for the best, I ordered it.

Well, let me tell you, I am very glad I did, and that I got this system instead of the 8232, because the handset ergonomics are excellent. This phone feels great in the hand, and the menu is navigated via a wheel/button instead of a joystick type stub. The buttons are large and easy to use, and the display, while not color, is also clear, uncluttered, and easy to read. When you pick the handset up off the base, a backlight turns on for ease of reading, but when the handset is just sitting on the base, the backlight is turned off and in dim light, is definitely hard to read. This is easily remedied by just picking the phone up, of course. The handset has a subtle curve to its side profile: it isn't flat-faced. And this is part of its nice feel. The back is nicely bellied out, too, which fills the hand better and makes for a good grip. The plastic feels good, for plastic, too. More importantly, this thing can get LOUD if you want it to: both the speaker phone and the regular ear speaker will go up louder than you would probably ever want them to. The speaker phone works exceptionally well, too--the people on the other end of the line might not even know you switched over to speaker phone, in fact. Very impressive. And the range is very good. The talk time, too, is better than you'll probably ever need. Even after talking on the phone for over an hour, the battery still indicated full. So, while I haven't yet tested the 17 hour claim, it doesn't seem unlikely. However, some reviews have mentioned a problem with talk time / batteries, and this doesn't surprise me. You see, almost without exception, the rechargeable batteries used in things like cordless phones are junk. They are cheap and low quality. In this case, the batteries are probably a bit better than that, but I would suggest that you preemptively purchase truly high-quality batteries to go in your handsets (you need two per handset). I highly recommend the Sanyo Eneloop 4 Pack AAA NiMH Pre-Charged Rechargeable Batteries. And they have higher capacity than the batteries provided with the phone, too. However, you are unlikely to have a problem with the batteries provided!

The charging system in the handset bases is quite intelligent, and will terminate charge once the batteries are full. I checked the temperature of both the provided and the Sanyo Eneloop cells immediately after charge, and they were only mildly warm. If you remove the handset and then immediately replace it, the system will still know that the batteries are fully charged and will not initiate a new charging cycle. Even if you actually use the phone for a minute or so and then place it back on the base, it will still not initiate a new charging cycle. You have to use the handset for a full four or five minutes before the charging circuitry will decide to recharge the batteries. And once again, when it does this, it doesn't overcharge or overheat them. Very nice. The biggest reason why NiCd and NiMH batteries are destroyed is constant overcharging, and this has been totally eliminated here. Also, as mentioned, the fact that these phones use standard NiMH AAA batteries is a very nice feature. When and if you need to replace them, you don't need to pay highway robbery prices for a special battery pack.

The sound quality of this phone system is very good. The best I've heard apart from my Sony. (Yes, believe it or not, it's just not quite as good as my 11 year old Sony. But . . . it's still quite good.) And, you have the advantage of digital spread spectrum with this phone, on a frequency that will not interfere with anything else. Not only is it a lot more secure than my old phone, but two other people can get on the line with you, on the other handsets. We bought this two handset version, so I can't personally verify that three handsets can all be active at once, but I'm sure this claim is true. Anyway, this feature isn't just enabled when someone is talking to an outside caller. No. You can intercom between handsets any time you want. Just pick up your handset, press the intercom button in the lower right, and select the assigned number of the other handset, and it rings. When the other person picks up and presses talk, you are on the line with them. This feature is actually so useful that it's almost too useful--my wife is taking full advantage of it to ask me to bring such and such upstairs when I come up (or downstairs when I come down) or to ask me about something, and etc. It's very very useful.

I have on occasion noticed that I need to adjust the ear-speaker volume when making or receiving a new call, even though the volume level had previously been just right. But, it doesn't happen often, and it's really no big deal. Too loud? Just push the menu button up arrow. Too soft, just push the down. Just one adjustment has always brought things back into the right range for me.

And, yes, if you want a phone handset with an easy to turn off and on ringer, this is not it. To turn the ringer off, you essentially have to turn the volume all the way down. It's just not set up for doing this easily, although it can be done.

The answering system is fine, although the sound quality of the recorded messages isn't great. However, when someone is leaving a message, you can hear it on all the handsets, which is a nice feature if you screen your calls and are away from the base station. And, while the blinking red light to indicate a new message is only on the base station, each handset will say "new message" on the LCD screen when there is a new message, so I don't see what the big deal is here. Besides, in our case, the phone base station is by the door, so that's the only place we really need the red blinking LED. When you we get back home, we give the base station a quick glance. Seems straightforward and logical to me.

Oh, and I mounted the base station to the wall, and it worked just fine. I'm sure it's not hard to break the plastic mounting piece which allows you to mount the base station to the wall, but it didn't seem flimsy or cheap to me. It's plastic, sure, but what do you want?

All in all, this is a five star product in my opinion. I would go for 4.5 stars or 4.75 stars if that were an option, but have rounded up to five. The only slight issue with this phone, in my opinion, is the difficulty in turning off the ringer of a handset. So if you need to do that on a regular basis, this would be a four star cordless phone system. Otherwise, it's a five star. Highly recommended.

*EDIT*

OK. I have had some noise / interference type issues--or at least that's what they sound like--but when I switched over to a VoIP setup, this problem pretty much went away.

So, there was this subtle, but definite, background digital noise in this phone that was better on some days, some calls, and worse on others. At first I didn't notice this much, and when I did, I figured it was due to the other persons phone. Then, I figured it was possibly noise on our line that this new phone is able to pick up due to the spread spectrum encoding or something. So I bought an inline DSL noise filter. No change. I also tried a different telephone socket. I also tried removing the batteries from the handsets and powering down the base station, and then powering everything back up. No joy.

However, when I switched over to a VoIP setup (with the Linksys SPA2102 VoIP box) this noise problem pretty much went away. I think its a signal-to-noise ratio thing, as the line level out of the 2102 is a lot higher than my plain old telephone line, but the noise seems to be a low-level thing, when it is there at all. So if the signal is weak and you amplify it up, you bring the noise with it. In any case, I am also going to check to see if it is just my set being defective, and will report back. I have some sense it might be this, as one handset is better than the other when it comes to the noise problem.

I also have changed the answering machine settings from 3 min messages to 1 min, and hope that this will improve the sound quality of the recorded messages, which are only just passable right now.

In any case, while this phone may not be perfect, it's still the best you can get for any reasonable amount of money. If I had money to burn, I might buy the Engenius Long-Range phone set, but $600 is just too much money to spend on a cordless phone!!!

Well I cannot say I am complaining. It is nice to have two handsets instead of one. There are four things I would change about this phone:

1. I would allow the second base to have a "pager" button. Often times we can find neither handset, and I rather dislike having to go all the way downstairs in order to page the phones.

2. I would have a lighted keypad for better functionality in the dark.

3. I would allow for the time to be displayed even if there is a message. Too often there is a "Mew Message" sign on the screen when all I want to find out is the time.
(I am not a big user of answering machines at all although I do appreciate them.)

4. I would have even more ring tones available (trivial).

A word about claims:

--Battery life does seem to be very long, although I never really timed it. I am also comparing it to the phones that we have had previously. Those had proprietary batteries that couldn't hold a charge after two years.

--Range is superb as is sound quality. This thing works three to four houses down the street (although that drains the battery somewhat). I tried it.

--No interference with Wireless-G.

I am not sure you can do much better than this for phones. Why would you buy another?

Since I live in a very tiny house, I thought I didn't really need two handsets, but it's actually been quite nice to have two. Unlike some other reviewers, I didn't have any trouble with the wall mount (it isn't very attractive, however). When I read other reviewers' comments that they wished the handset buttons were lighted, I didn't give it much thought, but actually it really matters, and that's why I didn't give the phone the fifth star. I hadn't realized how many phone calls I make in the dark. Most importantly, though, the reception is good. I can vist my brother at his nearby house and still get my phone calls.

This phone is a joke. The handset in our office, regardless of whether the base is in another room, or in the office, rarely works. We always get the message that it is too far from the base. Odd, because our 14-year-old Panasonic cordless works in our office while the base is in the kitchen, in fact, it works in every room in the house, and outdoors as well. We're planning on returning this phone and buying another because we need a phone in our office. Had we known what we know now, we NEVER would have purchased it. We have had the phone since last December -- about 6 months. Do yourself a favor and don't buy this telephone.

The only reason I gave this phone 1 star is because I can't give it zero! I bought this phone as a replacement for a 5-year-old VTECH cordless phone that I bought for $15. While the VTECH phone was deficient in many ways (poor battery life, questionable sound quality), at least it always had a clear connection to the base from anywhere in my apartment. The problem with this phone started when I hooked it up, charged it overnight, and then turned it on. Without even calling anyone, I could tell there was a "connection" problem between the handset and the base. Anytime I walked more than 10 feet away from the base, the dial tone (and, when I called people, their voices) began to crack and break up, even if I was in direct line-of-sight to the base. By the time I got to the other end of my apartment (about 40 feet away), the breaking-up of the signal was so bad, it was impossible to have a conversation. I called Panasonic tech services, who walked me through a couple of steps ("registering" the handset to the base, etc.), but nothing helped. So I called Customer Service and arranged to return the phone (at my own expense.) I was assured that they would "thoroughly test" a replaement phone before they sent it to me. I then waited about 12 days for the replacement phone to show up. My first surprise came when I openend the shipping box. While I had sent them my brand new phone, carefully repacked in the retail box, the phone I received from them contained all the parts taped and shrink-wrapped onto a piece of cardboard. (It turns out that they replace any returned phone, even a brand new one, with a "refurbished" phone, which I take to mean someone else's broken phone which they have attempted to repair. I'm sure that, as I write this, someone somewhere is receiving my broken phone as a replacement for the one they sent in.) Sure enough, I plugged in this phone and charged it, and then turned it on. It had the same problem. Not as bad, but by the time I was about 20 feet away from the base, the "crackling" and breaking up began, and at 40 feet away, it was noticeable and disturbing. I called Customer Service, and the rep said that the problem was due to where the phone base was located, and I should move it somewhere else. I explained that the phone was in my kitchen, plugged into the only phone jack in my apartment (and that the cheap VTECH phone had never had this problem.) He then insisted that the problem was "interference" from nearby "electronic devices". I explained that the only electrical devices nearby were a refrigerator and a dishwasher, and the nearest computer was about 20 feet away. He then suggested I take the phone to a neighbor's home, plug it in, and walk around their apartment testing the phone (I'm sure!). So he said I would have to return the phone and wait for a replacement, and offered to email me a prepaid UPS label, which he said I would receive by email in "24-48 hours". I asked why I hadn't been offered a prepaid UPS label the first time I returned the phone, and he said he didn't know. I asked what would happen if the next phone they sent me had the same problem, and he said I would have to return that phone too, and they would then "consider another solution", but he wouldn't tell me what that other solution was. I asked to speak to a Supervisor, and was put on hold for 15 minutes. When a Supervisor finally came on the line, he asked me to explain my problem from the beginning. I asked him if he had not been briefed by the rep (during my 15 minute wait!) or read about my problem in the case file, and he said he had, but it was their policy to "hear the whole story from the customer". After going through the whole thing again, he offered no new information, assistance, or solutions. I asked him why they had Supervisors if they were not empowered to do anything more than the reps to satisfy an unhappy customer, and he had no answer. To end this long story, I received the prepaid UPS label 6 days later (!), but it was too late. I have bought a new phone, made by a competitor and less expensive (which worked fine right out of the box) and thrown this piece of junk in the garbage and chalked it up to an expensive lesson: don't buy products from this company.